March 3rd, 2008
God’s Will or Free Will?
There are as many as 1 billion Christians, or at least people who call themselves Christians. We know that the number of faithful practicing Christians is much smaller. But let’s say there are a billion practicing, active Christians in the world today. There are 6.5 billion humans alive today, which means there are 5.5 billion people who reject Christianity.
So according to Christian thinking, God created 5.5 billion people who he KNEW would burn in hell for eternity. Remember that God is omniscient, when means he knows everything. He knew before you were created that I would burn in hell for eternity for not accepting him, yet still created me anyway. Of course God’s omniscience can be debated using Biblical passages, but that’s fodder for another discussion.
Many Christians will jump in and say, “Well God gives us free will to make our own decisions.” That is highly debatable (free will in this context isn’t covered much in the Bible, and many of the passages that do pertain to it imply that people don’t have free will). And it is a moot point. No matter what we choose, an omniscient God will know beforehand what our choices are. A truly merciful God would not bring us into existence in order to avoid an eternity in hell as punishment for a few misguided years on earth. (Billions upon untold billions of years of punishment in hell for a couple of decades of non-belief? That’s hardly the punishment fitting the crime!) Free will or not – he should know my choice but lets it all happen anyway. So in other words, if free will exists, God sits on his hands and lets us take the wrong path, and then punishes us for it in the end. If free will doesn’t exist, we were put here for the sole reason to burn in hell forever. NICE!
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:29 pm
It’s problems like this that John Calvin sought to resolve. His solution (which is perfectly consistent with Scripture, of course!), was that certain people were members of “the Elect,” i.e., people who God had foreordained to be saved. And if you were not chosen to be a member of this elite club? Sucks to be you! Off you go to God’s microwave oven!
And so the little problem is solved, but now God has an image problem. It makes him look like a capricious monster. After consulting Madison Avenue, Calvin came up with an answer: God is Sovereign. This means he can do whatever he likes to his creation (which is perfectly consisted with Scripture, of course!) and who are we, measly little sinners that we are, to question God’s Will ™?
Thought for the day: If you punch a Calvinist in the face, can he rightly be mad at you? After all, God made you do it.